One of Tou

Toucan, 20x24, with travel bag of ziplock collage papers

Those of you who follow this Blog know that I work in all kinds of interesting places in order to be so prolific. I've showed you many a small piece done on my airplane tray table as well as some work on my lap while waiting in the doctor's office.

Toucan, 20x24, in my stateroom on Carnival Cruise

This week I started working on my Noah's Ark Themed solo exhibition for next April. I just got off the ship this morning with one completed Toucan in hand. I worked for at least 20-30minutes per day on him in my state room and pushed to finish him yesterday afternoon. These were extenuating circumstances, because my plan is to create two at a time, side by side on the easel. In the interest of small spaces I had to create this one without his partner. I worked from my travel bags of papers, so I'll just use the same bags to create the other half of his pair.

In this series my goal is to have some fun with abstracted backgrounds

Next up is the Owl pair and I may have to do them before I finish the other toucan as I've been asked by a rather large licensing client to create a pair of owls for reproduction. ]

Toucan, 20x24, Completed!

Stay tuned!

Tou by Twos

Noah's Ark Series
I've been asked to exhibit 50 pieces at the Thrasher Horne Center for the Arts at St. John's River State College in Orange Park FL. The show will run April 28 to June 16, 2012.

My concept for the show is a Noah's Ark theme with 25 pairs of brightly colored animal collages. I want to make them actual pairs, with elements and/or colors that cross over between the two, to reinforce the theme. I'd also like to create an oversized ark piece for the anchor piece of the exhibit. I'm excited about this show but my husband, who has a much better grip on math than I do, informed me the other day that at this rate I need to be producing three collages a week to meet my deadline of 50 pieces by next April. Um, yikes!

Yesterday I placed an order for 50 20x24 American Easel Wood Painting Panels from DickBlick.com. Not sure where I will store all of this, but we'll cross that bridge when we get there!

If you are working on a big show and need to order such a high volume of materials from Blick, know that you can call their customer service and tell them that you are purchasing in volume. I was able to negotiate an excellent per panel price from them, much lower than I have ever seen in the sale catalogue.

Stay tuned for more sets of twos but this is my first, Toucans. I thought you might like the word play there, I know I do!

I'm headed out on a cruise to Mexico this morning and I have one of these in my suitcase, I kid you not! I can't do any blogging or emailing this week, it's going to be technology free, but I'll be taking photos of my work in progress in my cabin and will share with you when I return.

Thank goodness I have a big suitcase.